…says Godswill Akpabio’s spectacular victory has banished sleep from Hilltop mansion
THE END OF PDP IN AKWA IBOM STATE IS HERE!
The rumour mill is awash with fake news that the Governorship Candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Obong Akanimo Udofia is either considering stepping down or has been pressured to step down for the Young Progressives Party (YPP) Governorship Candidate Senator Bassey Albert Akpan.
It is obvious that the purveyors of this falsehood are disgruntled members of the tattered umbrella party – Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) – who are still nursing wounds from the defeat suffered on February 25, 2023 Presidential and National Assembly elections.
For the avoidance of doubts and for the benefit of our teeming members, supporters and the general public, Obong Akanimo Udofia remains the Candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Akwa Ibom State and will contest the March 11, 2023 Gubernatorial elections on the platform of the Party.
While political and strategic alliances and collaboration are healthy and also form a part of any democratic system, the All Progressives Congress (APC) shall not jettison or substitute its shared prosperity agenda for another. Our convictions on how best to steer the ship of the state and our people out of the woods of mediocrity, cluelessness and state-induced poverty cannot be negotiated away. The membership strength of our Party, the acceptability of our Gubernatorial flagbearer and his running mate as well as the trust Akwa Ibom people have demonstrated in the credibility, integrity and capacity of Obong Akanimo Udofia stands the party in a good stead to face the polls headlong.
We welcome parties who subscribe to our shared prosperity agenda to join us in liberating Akwa Ibom State from the clutches of state-sponsored poverty. An APC-led government shall work for the good of all.
Obong Akanimo Udofia and Senator Bassey Albert Akpan are distinguished sons of Akwa Ibom State and they share mutual respect, but their ideologies, world-view and individual strengths differ. What resonates strongly between these illustrious sons of Akwa Ibom State is their determination to save our land from prebendalism, clannishness and petty politics of deliberately impoverishing the people in the midst of abundant resources.
Understandably, the outcome of last Saturday’s Presidential and National Assembly elections has reverberated with shock waves through the Hilltop mansion as candidates of the APC made appreciable showing at the polls despite concerted efforts to manipulate the process using compromised INEC personnel and security agents. Senator Godswill Akpabio’s spectacular victory has banished sleep from Hilltop mansion. The election showed that the PDP’s days of iron-fisted reign had waned in Akwa Ibom State and will soon come to an end.
The election in Akwa Ibom North-West Senatorial District was a total revolt against the PDP and nothing can change the narrative now. Worthy of note is that majority of those who supported the “uncommon movement” were senior members of the PDP who voted in protest against the obvious failings of the present government. Come March 11, 2023, they will vote against the PDP again. They will vote against tenure elongation. They will reject a system where one “walking stick-wielding mortal” plays God with the resources of Akwa Ibom people. The people will remind Governor Udom Emmanuel that his tenue will end on May 29, 2023 and no effort will be spared to ensure that this unjustified tenure elongation nay succession plan is halted.
The uncommon trouncing of PDP in Ikot Ekpene Senatorial District is a precursor to an end and this has thrown Governor Udom Emmanuel into panic mode. Members of the Party who lost in their polling units have desperately been shopping for excuses for their losses. They have therefore fingered an alliance between the YPP and APC as a convenient excuse! It is this category of fast expiring politicians that have devised another sub-head to plunder State’s resources and continually suppress our youths.
The idea in their camp is to pitch the APC against the YPP and create confusion to forestall a possible alignment of forces. They reason that Senator Akpabio must be fingered in the confusion they have conjured up in their warped minds to turn the people against him. Thay have failed already. Senator Akpabio’s victory is an affirmation of the people’s love for him and an emphatic rejection of a PDP/INEC alliance as it was in the Igini era.
No matter the resources wasted to thwart the will of the people, we shall overcome. We see that all of a sudden, the palliatives distributed by President Muhammadu Buhari during the COVID-19 scare which were hoarded have emerged from the blues and are being shared out to PDP supporters to appease them and get their votes. A minimum of N500, 000. 00 (Five Hundred Thousand Naira) is also allegedly being shared out in all the polling units in the State; these are funds that would have been deployed to pay ailing pensioners and their dependents, but it is being wasted on the ego of one man!
We call on lovers of the State to resist the PDP and its candidates. To our youths: let’s take back our State with our PVC and realign the trajectory of our destinies. We must reject these opportunistic leaders who do not wish to see the rest of us grow and thrive in our land. We must stop them from using our God-given resources to impoverish and subjugate us. Let their children also come out, stand in the sun and vote.
The time is now!
Barr. Imo E. Akpan,
Director of Communications/Spokesperson,
Akanimo Udofia Campaign Council
2/1/2023